1. Field of the Invention
The present invention generally relates to recording medium driving apparatuses, and more particularly a disk drive which performs a recording and/or reproducing operation on a disk-shaped magnetic recording medium housed in a disk cartridge.
2. Description of the Related Art
A magnetic disk drive detachably accommodates a disk cartridge housing a flexible magnetic disk. Such a magnetic disk drive is required to have a reduced thickness and a reduced size. A finer production is required to assemble such a compact magnetic disk drive.
A reduced thickness of the magnetic disk drive results in a narrower gap between the insertion height of the disk cartridge inserted into a holder and the height of a lower magnetic head supported by a head carriage. When the disk cartridge is warped so that a deformed projection faces downward, the front end of the disk cartridge inserted in the holder may contact with the lower magnetic head.
Japanese Patent Publication No. 6-103573 discloses a disk cartridge contact preventing mechanism which prevents the front end of the disk cartridge from coming into contact with the lower magnetic head when the disk cartridge is inserted into the holder. The contact preventing mechanism includes a protruding part, a contact preventing member and a rotary lever. The protruding part is provided to the upper surface of a frame. The contact preventing member restricts the disk cartridge inserting position so that the disk cartridge rides over the protruding part when the disk cartridge is inserted into the holder in order to prevent the end of the disk cartridge from coming into contact with the lower magnetic head. The rotary lever has an end joined to the contact preventing member, and another end joined to a slider having an ejection button.
When the disk cartridge is inserted into the holder, the holder moves down from the disk cartridge inserting position. Further, the slider slides and the rotary lever is thus rotated. Hence, the rotary lever moves the contact preventing member to a contact preventing position or a refuge position in which the contact preventing member is spaced away from the disk cartridge.
Recently, there has been considerable activity in increasing the recording capacity of the magnetic disk by increasing the revolution of the disk and thus recording information thereon at an increased density. Such a large-capacity magnetic disk drive, a floating force caused by an air flow generated by high-speed rotation of the magnetic disk is applied to the magnetic head. Hence, the magnetic head flies above the disk and is maintained so that it is slightly spaced apart from the disk. Hence, the magnetic head is prevented from damaging the disk surface.
When the magnetic disk drive is equipped with the above-mentioned disk cartridge contact preventing mechanism, the magnetic disk drive is required to have a space in which the mechanism is installed. Further, it is required to provide, on the upper surface of the frame, the contact preventing member and the rotary lever of the contact preventing mechanism in order to transfer the sliding operation of the slider to the contact preventing member via the rotary lever. Hence, the rotary lever limits the shape of the contact preventing member and the range of the rotary operation. In addition, the assembly work is troublesome because the contact preventing mechanism is assembled by a large number of parts.